Supertaxis 2007

[Neil]

Geoff,,,I love a man in the know and seeing as I don't have that anymore what do you think should BE of the "Control" nature. Seems the brake package is somewhat of a flop with some teams having spent more money than they would have in the past. Rims are out of control at the moment with all the big boys running that ugly looking rim which have cost a small fortune and now everbody will have to follow suit or should everbody just keep sending. Personally sooner or later all this mega buck spending has gotta stop.

I would like to see a heap of aero taken out of the cars at the slower tracks which maybe would make for some more overtaking. Seems to me the V8's are going down the same road as F1 with all the passing done in the pits.

GO FROSTY.

Neil.

[gtr660hp]

The spending will never stop regardless of how many control parts are introduced...if 888 racing have 8 mill a season to spend they will spend it regardless.....things will never be even and the rich teams will always spend more and generally win everything...thats motorsport

The aero thing is partiallly valid but most of the time the passing doesnt occur because the tyres are gone after about half race distance and the driver is just happen to keep the thing on the road, especially the top ten guys...better to stay in say 7th and get the points rather than to have a lunge and screw it up and get nothing....look at tander in tassie

[Neil]

Yep understand everything you've said and agree,,,so how do we make them take the chance up the inside or the outside for that matter and have the "Lunge".

I fully understand that not every team can fight for the lead but some passing MUST be done on the track or V8's will end up like F1 and even worse DTM.

My other view is some of the track they run on,,,,Winton being the prime example,,,one line no passing Unless someone screws up.

You say the tyres are gone,,,so they need a harder tyre,,,so tragic grip to start with and it gets better as the race goes on,,,I could live with that.

Neil.

[blackrex]

Simple, only give them points for the first 8 places (a la F1) and make a bigger gap between places.

[Roy]

Something that has never made sense to me is the wheel diameter they run on. Back before control tyres were introduced Wayne Gardner was at the powers to be to allow the cars to run 18" or 19" wheels, as he was struggling on the Dunlops and Bridgestone, Yoko and Dunlop were making the tyres specific for the category as no other class runs that size wheel on that weight of car. I seem to recall he wanted to run Michelin for budget reasons, but they did not want to commit to the dollars required to develop a tyre for the class.

So, change the tyres size, and bring back different tyre manufactueres. In order to get good racing you need a speed differential over the race difference. It was always interesting to watch the better starting Dunlops go up against the more consistant Bridgestones over a race distance.

So thats my 2c. Up the tyre size and suppliers, and also up the rev limit a little, or with the control ecu allow them to run 90seconds etc with an increased rev limit.

[Beer Baron]

bring in the push to pass! and don't bad mouth DTM. I just watched the season review and the race at barce I think it was was pretty intersting. plenty of tappa tappa tappa and in the end old wolfy called all the audis into the pits in protest. hehe, never seen so many happy merc drivers who all got free points!

[gtr660hp]

Something that has never made sense to me is the wheel diameter they run on. Back before control tyres were introduced Wayne Gardner was at the powers to be to allow the cars to run 18" or 19" wheels, as he was struggling on the Dunlops and Bridgestone, Yoko and Dunlop were making the tyres specific for the category as no other class runs that size wheel on that weight of car. I seem to recall he wanted to run Michelin for budget reasons, but they did not want to commit to the dollars required to develop a tyre for the class.

So, change the tyres size, and bring back different tyre manufactueres. In order to get good racing you need a speed differential over the race difference. It was always interesting to watch the better starting Dunlops go up against the more consistant Bridgestones over a race distance.

So thats my 2c. Up the tyre size and suppliers, and also up the rev limit a little, or with the control ecu allow them to run 90seconds etc with an increased rev limit.

We are stuck with 17's and that wont change...at least in the next 3 years anyway. No one wants to spent upward of a 1000 bucks a rim to go to 18's...especially the big teams who have many sets. The idea of soft compound tyres like in Champ car is growing and that may mix things up a bit making the tyre compulsory for one stint of the race but pretty much everyone will work out the best stratagy and all do the same thing unless they are having a gamble cause they are way back. The comp. fuel/tyre stops was supposed to mix it up but all it has done is make us do pit stops for the hell of it and not really mixed it up at all ...its a tough question 'how do we get passing' and hard to get a definitive answer. As a team like most teams we dont put it as a top priority cause passing causes damage and costs...but I guess to keep the crowds coming we need passing to keep the interest up. Many people bag the shit out of guys like Morris but at least he will have a go and yeah he crashes sometimes, but at least that gets people talking

[Beer Baron]

lol. paul morris is mr entertainment that's for sure. he doesn't mind putting you on the grass should you dare to try and overtake. and he has no problem with making his move from about 5 lengths back all locked up. I reckon he learned to race playing gran turismo and realised that if you come into a corner too hot, just use the other blokes car to slow you down... fun to watch but I wouldn't want to be next to him coming into the cutting.

[blackrex]

I didn't think that the cost of upgrading to an 18" or 19" rim would have been as bad as that, considering that most teams discard/make in to test/transport use the rims after 4~5 rounds anyway. as they tend to crack after that sort of usage. Therefore they could start buying in stocks of a larger rim mid year and spread the costs over the year.

[gtr660hp]

I didn't think that the cost of upgrading to an 18" or 19" rim would have been as bad as that, considering that most teams discard/make in to test/transport use the rims after 4~5 rounds anyway. as they tend to crack after that sort of usage. Therefore they could start buying in stocks of a larger rim mid year and spread the costs over the year.

We have 90% of our rims from the last 3 seasons....but in Fujitsu we only do 7 rounds with less laps so they last longer....

I guess 18's would bring the price of tyres up to, as it is the 17's are bloody dear cause of being made in Nagoya and being a special process to make them.....depending on compound I couldnt see the 18's making a huge difference in racing anyway...the point discussed here is overtaking and if everything stayed the same exept the rims size I couldnt see much difference

Anyway its all irrelevant at least until 2012 when the control tyre contract comes up again

We are spending 100k on new engines, 30k on rebuilds after every 2500 klms, 11k on 1 gerabox etc etc so any cost cutting helps us....maybe 888 or HRT wouldnt care but we do.

[gtr660hp]

lol. paul morris is mr entertainment that's for sure. he doesn't mind putting you on the grass should you dare to try and overtake. and he has no problem with making his move from about 5 lengths back all locked up. I reckon he learned to race playing gran turismo and realised that if you come into a corner too hot, just use the other blokes car to slow you down... fun to watch but I wouldn't want to be next to him coming into the cutting.

Yeah its good to watch...he is a great guy to...unlike some

[Whiplash]

Simple, only give them points for the first 8 places (a la F1) and make a bigger gap between places.

well it worked in Tassie with Tander throwing it up the inside of Richo to gain a few extra points, as blackrex said maybe cut it from 15 to 8.

lost my contacts in the V8's now so back to being an average joe when it comes to the "supercars"

[gtr660hp]

well it worked in Tassie with Tander throwing it up the inside of Richo to gain a few extra points, as blackrex said maybe cut it from 15 to 8.

lost my contacts in the V8's now so back to being an average joe when it comes to the "supercars"

Next year its going back to first 30 cars home get points....which is nearlly the whole field....the teams who regularly finished say 16th to 25th kicked up a stink saying they deserve to get some sort of points for their efforts and sponsors (I dont really agree...Id rather see top 10 or 15 cars only getting points)

[Whiplash]

the points system has been a joke for many years,

last year it was close to being good and now they go and stuff it up again. will they have the drop your worse round again?? that has been one of my personal biggest problem with the system. All it does is punish consistency, its better for a driver to go out and get 2 DNFs on purpose in 1 event instead of trying to win them all

does this make it 8 years in a row with a different point system?

VESA - sort this shit out, you are meant to be running a professional series here!!!!!

[gtr660hp]

^^^^^ believe me there is no one more frustrated than us...we are sick of the changes with the points and I agree 07 was the best system and now they are going back to basically the old system again..,..and no they are not dropping their worst round at least

The best ever though is the Wakefield Fujitsu round this year looks like being a 500klm race with 2 drivers of which one driver is to be a level one driver ha ha...what a joke...I cant see too many level one guys putting thier hand up for that one.

[Whiplash]

really. i can't see to many level one drivers wanting to step down. but then again how if they did how many would bring their own mechanics and engineers. We have had a similar thing with the sports cars with a seeded and unseeded driver. It gets messy when you mess with the driver Seeding system. all the politics on who is and isn't seeded got really messy last month at sandown with some top Carrera cup drivers seeded and other not.

[Roy]

I can see some of the Jr teams of the main players having drivers run the Wakefield 500. After all it would be nothing more then an extended test for the teams. With test restrictions i can see a number of drivers driving the Jr car.

The real problem will be the privateer teams with no affiliation to a main game team.

[gtr660hp]

We have a couple of mid pack Level 1 guys we are speaking to and most not real keen for many reasons...i have a snaeking feeling some of those reasons are they might not be quicker or much quicker than some of the Fujitsu guys ha ha....egos wont allow for that

[Duncan]

so....without giving too much away, how much does a mid field level 1 driver want to drive a car?

[gtr660hp]

^^^^now that would be telling tales out of school